Talk Back: There’s a great future in – canvas?

Friday

Sep 7, 2018 at 12:00 PMSep 7, 2018 at 7:07 PM

Kroger will still have paper bags. For now. But the game plan is to dump them too, and make each store BYOB. Bring your own bag. And if you forget, there will be plenty available on the rack in front of Aisle 12. For two bucks a pop.

Ever get the urge to study human behavior? Just set up shop at the nearest store’s check-out lanes. It’s the happening spot for all kinds of wild, weird stuff. Like folks standing in line for the self-scan terminals — even when it snakes completely around the store — because nothing beats the thrill of taking 10 times longer than a cashier to ring up your purchases. And don’t bother telling them there’s no waiting on Aisle 14. They won’t budge.

Because everyone knows self-serve is faster.

But if you really want to see eccentricity in action, just hang out with us. We’re always putting it on public display. Like the other day, when we had to stop the clerk in mid-stuff as she was putting our purchases into plastic bags — just as she had done for countless other shoppers. When we told her what we wanted instead, she turned pale and made a hasty phone call — casting furtive glances in our direction as she frantically spoke in a hushed tone, “What do I do? They want — you know — the other kind.”

It took more than an hour for them to find someone who knew the combination on Jack Benny’s vault in the catacombs and retrieve the paper bags we wanted.

Since they’re easier to pack, hold more groceries and tend to remain upright, paper has always been our preference. But plastic seems the best choice when buying only one or two items. And it excels at preventing freshly misted heads of cabbage and radishes from saturating everything else in the paper sack. But with plastic being the default option for most shoppers, stores are eager to keep them happy. Even when the oranges inside fall out, roll around the car’s interior during the drive home, and get wedged under the brake pedal at the exact moment a mailbox and post leap right into the vehicle’s path. So it was quite the surprise when Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen dropped a bombshell a couple weeks ago.

The Cincinnati-based chain will eliminate all single-use plastic bags from its stores within the next six years.

The way COO Mike Donnelly tells it, the move to more sustainable options — that’s grocery store speak for “we want to con you into buying a whole bunch of our canvas bags” — is happening because the company is finally paying attention to what their customers want. And those shoppers, CEO Rodney McMullen says, are adamant that it makes no sense to use all this plastic only once and then throw it away. Therefore, Kroger’s embarking on a zero-waste strategy that won’t be fully implemented until 2025. After all, the 9 million shoppers who walk through their doors every day can’t be expected to convert from plastic bags to reusable ones overnight.

Wait a sec. If Kroger customers are having such a conniption about plastic bags, why does it take six years to convince them to switch to something else? Color us cynical, but this warm and fuzzy “see how responsive we are” explanation sounds a lot more like “watch our profits soar when we quit buying six billion plastic bags every year.” Oh, Kroger will still have paper bags. For now. But the game plan is to dump them too, and make each store BYOB. Bring your own bag. And if you forget, there will be plenty available on the rack in front of Aisle 12.

For two bucks a pop.

For the record, we haven’t set foot inside a Kroger in years. We do all our grocery shopping locally. But the biggest impediment to business success is a customer base scorned. Forcing behavior modification techniques upon an unwilling public usually only makes them dig in their heels all the deeper. They don’t get mad. They get even.

We don’t buy industry analysts’ contention that a nationwide plastic bag ban is imminent. Or that all other chains will be quick to adopt the Kroger model. If a few hundred thousand plastic bag devotees swap going Krogering for a trip to the Piggly Wiggly instead, the nation’s No. 2 grocer will shuffle to the back of the pack faster than the NASCAR driver left hung out to dry after pulling out of line during a restrictor plate race — hoping in vain that others will follow. All it takes for McMullen and Co.’s gambit to supplant Ron Johnson’s disastrous J.C. Penney makeover for top honors on the list of all-time worst business blunders is a little smart marketing.

“We’ve got your plastic bags. Right here.”

Talk Back with Doug Spade and Mike Clement is heard every Saturday morning from 9 am to noon Eastern Time on WABJ, 1490 AM, Adrian, and on line at www.dougspade.com and www.lenconnect.com.

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